Social and inter-personal communication tools have been enriched by technologies like SMS, MMS, and speech to text, as well as web services and websites such as Twitter, Facebook and MySpace. Currently, inter-personal communication and social networking are extremely popular with users of all ages. This phenomenon is not showing signs of a slow down.
Users of these inter-personal and social communications technology tools often develop a common communication style that can style can differ across different technology tools and environments or alternatively, within the same tools and environments. Factors for a change in communication style include age group, geographic location of the users, and local group, such as a school or club. Communication between different tools or environments is not always effective or accurate. For example, messages sent as an email, but received as a text, are often incomplete due to the size limit imposed on text messages. Accordingly, users are required to adapt based on the device, application, or service used. Common methods of adaptation include word shortcuts, word replacements, icons, and emoticons, as well as more abstract writing styles based on the technology tool or service. For instance, on Twitter, a user is limited to postings of 140 words, while no such limit is imposed on Facebook.
The shortcuts can include abbreviations, acronyms, emoticons, or graphics, as well as other shortcuts. For example, the digit 2 can be used in place of the words ‘to’ or ‘too’ when sending an SMS (Short Message Service) message. In a further example, children and teenagers might use the short code PIR, which stands for Parent In Room, or POS, which stands for Parent Over Shoulder when communicating with friends on Instant Messenger (“IM”) to warn their friends that a parent is near. Additionally, on Twitter, users may use the shortcut FF, which stands for Follow Friday, to suggest to their readers, other tweets and twitters to view and follow.
At the same time, there is a growing variety of tools that people can use to post content or send messages using the above described communication tools. For example, one can post entries (known as tweets) by various ways, such as accessing the Twitter website directly using a web browser, by using a variety of Personal Computer widgets, or by sending SMS messages to a predefined address. One could send SMS messages to other mobile phone users, by using a mobile phone, by using a web service, or by sending an email to a predefined email address typically provided by mobile operators.
A system and method to allow users of various communication tools and environments to bridge between their typical communication style, the capabilities of the device or method they are using to send a given message or post a given posting, and the expected style and grammar of the target communication tool or environment is needed.